


flamingo-less flight

by zombeesknees



Category: Alice (TV 2009)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-02
Updated: 2019-01-02
Packaged: 2019-10-02 16:35:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,123
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17267591
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zombeesknees/pseuds/zombeesknees
Summary: Alice is struggling with a flying phobia. Hatter finds a way to help her release the pent-up anxiety. | Written many moons ago on LJ.





	flamingo-less flight

“Where are we going again, exactly?”

Alice refrained from sighing, but only just. This had to be the sixth time he’d asked her that precise question in the last 24 hours.

“London, England,” she replied as she had five times before, albeit in a slightly terser voice. She glanced at the clock. Only a half hour left until boarding. She felt the muscles in her back tense.

Sitting in the airport terminal, a large map spread across his lap, Hatter looked remarkably like an average tourist. …If that tourist was from a 1980’s Jim Henson film. He’d combed down his hair and shaved, yes, but the green velvet jacket, black fedora and David-Bowie-tight jeans, loose maroon paisley tie and matching half-buttoned shirt suggested he was ready to break into a song-and-dance number with some Muppets at any moment.

And yet, somehow, he pulled it off effortlessly. No doubt to the average passerby he was simply an eccentric artist out sight-seeing.

Alice had no idea how he did it. Or how he could sit there so calmly.

“You’re not nervous, are you?” he said, glancing up from his map. His bangs were beginning to curl upwards towards the brim of his hat. A brush hadn’t been invented—here or in Wonderland—that could fully tame Hatter’s hair.

A pair of co-eds walked by, glancing over their shoulders with an impressive display of hair tossing and eyelash batting, flashing brilliant white smiles at Hatter as they did so. He didn’t notice, but Alice’s hands tightened in her lap.

“Hey,” he said, reaching out and laying his hand over one of hers. “You flew a Flamingo through a Jabberwock-infested forest, with a gun-toting Suit hot on your heels. You can handle an airplane, right?”

“I’m not nervous,” she said firmly, taking a deep breath to steady herself. “Just make sure I get the aisle seat. As long as I don’t look out the windows, I’ll be fine.”

He flashed that goofy grin of his, the one that made her instantly smile back even as she felt the blood rush to her cheeks. Curiouser and curiouser; she never would have thought she’d have a thing for buckteeth. She’d always gone more for the tall, fair, obviously muscular types—not that Hatter wasn’t muscular, no, but you had to get beyond the crazy jackets and hats and take off those paisley shirts he liked so much…

Her cheeks had to be nearly crimson. She wondered if there was a shop that sold shaved ice in this wing of the airport. 

“Alice,” he leaned closer, all concern and attentiveness, and something about the quiet way he said her name made her want to just grab his lapels and have her way with him right there in front of the school children and elderly man drinking a cup of Starbucks coffee. “Are you okay? You’re awfully red.”

“’M fine,” she said around the pressure in her chest. “I think I need a drink. To cool me down.” She stood up quickly.

“Okay…” He dragged the word out slowly, as if it were a piece of taffy, his eyes widening slightly. 

“Just watch my bag, I’ll be right back,” she stuttered. 

She bought an outrageously overpriced smoothie at the Jamba Juice down the hall and found herself pacing the length of the terminal, weaving around the hurrying businessmen and weary families dragging squeaky roller suitcases in their wake. 

Flying _always_ made her nervous. She didn’t have to look out the windows to remember she was thousands of feet above the ground, or that plane crashes happened every day, or that the contraptions were pretty damn flimsy when push came to turbulence. 

This would be the first time she’d flown since Wonderland. And while she wasn’t quite as frantic now as she’d been _before_ her insane (yet exhilarating) Flamingo flight, her palms were still slick and itchy with nervousness. 

Alice forced herself to stop pacing, pressed her back against the wall, and bowed her head. She made herself breathe deeply, evenly, and tried to recite all of the defensive stances she knew. 

“There was this bloke I knew once.”

The unexpected statement made her jump. She shook her head before looking up at Hatter. “Does this story involve shady dealings?”

“Not really. So there’s this bloke, right? And he _really_ wanted to know what concentrated Anticipation felt like. I warned him — told him too much is either not enough or bloody stupid, but he insisted. Offered me important information about the Casino. So I gave him a cup.”

“And?” 

“He had to be admitted to the Hospital of Dreams immediately, before he exploded or burst into flames. I had to pack him in a crate full of ice myself. Then they had to squeeze all of the Anticipation out of him before it caused any permanent damage.”

“…And you’re telling me this charming little story why?”

“Because you’re winding yourself up too tightly, and I don’t want you to explode or burst into flames.”

“Hatter, remember that this isn’t Wonderland. People don’t explode or burst into flames without the aid of chemical accelerants.”

“Well,” he conceded, bobbing his head. “Maybe that won’t happen _literally_. But metaphorically you’re like one of those round cartoon bombs with the sparkly fuses.” 

Alice sighed. “You’ve been watching Loony Tunes again, haven’t you?”

“Point is, Alice,” he said, brushing his hand along her arm. Every hair stood to attention at his touch, as if straining to maintain the contact. “You’ve got to relax a little.”

“Easier said than done,” she muttered. “It’s not like I can just immediately turn off the anxiety. I have to work it off—run a mile or practice my leg kicks or something.”

One of his dark eyebrows rose slowly, arching perfectly as that self-satisfied smile she remembered from their first meeting crept across his face. “...Work it off, eh?”

****

It was awkward. Cramped. And absolutely terrifying—Alice had an incredibly vivid image of a stewardess knocking reprovingly at the door and ordering them to come out immediately.

For perhaps a second. 

Because then Hatter’s mouth was at her neck, his wild hair brushing against her collarbone, and she’d wrapped his tie around her hand and her knee was pressed against his hip and _somehow_ he found the room and lifted her up—

If the pilot hadn’t been making an extremely shrill announcement over the PA, Alice was pretty sure most of the Economy class would have known _exactly_ what happened after that.

****

“So. First time on a real world airplane,” she said several hours later, as the plane was descending towards foggy London.

“Yep.”

“Fun?”

“I never had such a good time on a Scarab _or_ a Flamingo,” he said sincerely.


End file.
